There Was
by CrazygurlMadness
Summary: There was the way she laughed. There was the way the light danced in her eyes whenever she turned to smile at him. There was the way her cheeks flushed and the way she sauntered around her apartment like she owned the place—well, she did, and it showed.


**Yes, yes, Privateer is still ongoing. I'm working on it as we speak, despite the fact that time is making itself scarce. Whatever.**

**Just a little introspective piece, I guess. Totally safe.**

**There Was  
By CM**

There was many a reason for him to show up at her apartment building doorstep. He briefly reflected on this as he hesitated, finger hovering over her doorbell. He was freezing in the rain, but he didn't really think about it.

To begin, he thought, there were the little things she did every day, like hang her socks on her doorknobs to throw him off. Most of the time she put the stripped ones he'd bought her for the New Year's and they hung limply from her doorknobs all over her apartment, adding even more colour than there already was.

That was another part of it. She sometimes emptied one of the rooms in her apartment and repainted it, spontaneously, in funky colours. She'd most often call him over, and only once he was there did he understand he was to help her out. She caught him off guard too well. If he had dressed too cleanly, she'd pull his shirt off and hand him another paint-stained one, then shove a paintbrush into his hands and shoot him a brilliant smile.

Then, of course, there was that complete obliviousness to his body. It was like she could not see his worked-out abs or even his biceps. It seemed the only part of him that interested her was his mind, and the mouth that spoke it.

There was that way she constantly and good-humouredly pushed off his attempts at seduction, laughing them off, uncaring, as though he was only joking. She'd playfully shove him off, without even glancing his way, smiling all along.

Her favourite card game was solitaire, and he could sit in front of her and watch her play for hours on end, never tiring of the play of her fingers on the cards. He'd observe the way she stroked the cards and never comment on her game, waiting for one of her defeats to request the traditional kiss on the cheek.

There was that tradition, he remembered, that left his cheek to tingle and made him feel like he had won even though she had simply consented to give him a kiss every time she messed up a solitaire game. It only happened fifty per cent of the time, considering she was just plain talented, but he didn't mind. Some decks just weren't good, and he blessed those.

There was that way she forgot her clothes on the line out in the rain and had to leave them out twice as long for them to dry again. She would shrug if someone commented on the fact that rain left streaks on the sheets. She said it made them smell good, and that was that.

There was that collection of kiddie cartoons she kept on tape and watched whenever she felt bored, all lined up on her shelf. They were from the time when children's shows were still intelligent and actually taught the kids something significant. She said it was no wonder the day's current preteens were quite so dumb. Just look at the shows they watch, she said, and he'd argue that maybe they just made unintelligent choices and maybe the television wasn't to blame. It didn't matter to her. She was a fervent defender of media as a source of influence. What could he say to that?

There was the way she kept that useless cooking pot on her kitchen wall. It was what remained of a disastrous attempt at preparing cheese pasta. He always told her that even a nuclear explosion could not clean the object, but she kept it anyway, saying she would get to scrubbing it whenever her schedule cleared up.

He'd retort that she could do it while watching her kiddie shows, and she'd shoot him a piercing gaze, huffing. He really knew nothing to art, she'd say, but he never missed that little teasing smile of hers.

There was the way she did her bed when she came home from work rather than as she left for work. It was the strangest habit, which she reasoned poorly. Ultimately, she had simply admitted that she did it in case a visitor dropped by in the evening and glanced inside. It was a logical explanation, but it still left the door wide open for teasing and suggestion.

There was that spiral carpet in her entrance hallway that she kept at all times and sometimes pulled into her living room to lie down on it, just like that. He had stopped counting the times he'd reached down from the couch to tickle her exposed stomach, and the number of times that pointless flower vase had almost broken from one of their violent tickle fights.

There was the way she always forgot her car keys and called him up at unearthly hours of the morning to pick her up on the way to work so that she could get to searching her keys at the end of the day and not be late. That, of course, forced him awake from blissful dreams of her and made him tumble out of bed in a groaning heap of sheets and boxers. He'd never miss an occasion to see her, though.

There was the way she listened to songs in a barely noticeable fast-forward, just fast enough that someone who tried to sing along would lose the beat and stop in an embarrassed mumble. She liked seeing people trail off into speechlessness as much as she hated people singing along to her favourite songs. Playing them in fast-forward seemed, to her at least, like the most effective way to provide her with satisfaction.

There was the way her face lit up whenever he brought her sweets. She favoured ice cream, the very commercial kind, with the caramel swirls or with the brand chocolate chips mixed in. She would eat straight out of the container with a baby spoon, relishing in the way, she said, that her brain froze over. He didn't like her way of saying it, so he'd ruffle her hair and mimic warming her head up.

There was the way she laughed. There was the way the light danced in her eyes whenever she turned to smile at him. There was the way her cheeks flushed and the way she paled when she messed up and the way she sauntered around her apartment like she owned the place—well, she did, and it showed.

There was the way she'd cuddle up in front of her computer to read her mails, wrapped in thick bedspreads and warming her hands on a steaming mug of newly made coffee. It was, he mused, the only thing she succeeded in preparing without fail when in the kitchen. He loved the way the morning light played on her locks of hair, and the way her lips twitched upwards when she thought he didn't notice.

There was the way she yawned at the boring movies they went out to watch, and the way she hogged the popcorn he'd bought for her whenever he tried to steal some. There was the way she twirled her straw when they sat at a snack bar and had ordered soft drinks. There was the way she frowned at a dusty shelf and the way she ran her finger in the dust dubiously. There was the way she stumbled around her loft apartment with a rag and an aerosol bottle of cleaning products unenthusiastically, mumbling to herself about what she called "bloody dust".

There was the way she cuddled close to him when it was cold out. There was the way she offered him a beer whenever he came over, and always asked him to finish her second half, because she was, apparently, feeling dizzy. He never believed her; he accused her of trying to fuddle him.

There was the way she pinched his nose teasingly when he suggested that she had eviller intentions than her angelic looks gave away. There was the way she sheepishly asked him to open the marmalade jars and there was the way she hugged him in thanks, even when he'd merely spoken his mind and complimented her.

There was the way she hated crowds and secretly liked shopping and thought he didn't know. There was the way she hated but loved commercials, and the way she left her sappy romance novels lying around, reading a page from the one in the living room, then two from the kitchen and so on, at random, according to her whim.

There was the way she had offered him to stay the night last week.

And the way she had frowned when he'd hesitated in shock.

There was the way she'd grown bright red in embarrassment, and the way she'd started apologizing loudly, without meeting his gaze and without allowing him a word. There was the way she'd pushed him out of the apartment, the way she suggested he probably wanted to be elsewhere.

There was the way she'd closed the door on his stunned, stumbling form, and the way she'd started sobbing against the pane when she thought he had gone, when in fact he was sitting on her hallway floor.

There was the unbearable silence that followed, that lasted for a painful week. There were the unspoken words between them; there was her humiliated face and his discomfited gaze.

And there was that desire to see her again, more than anything, he mused, that pushed him to her doorstep that night in the rain.

There was the unthinkable crime of leaving her for so long that hung in the air and pushed his finger onto the bell. There was the deep silence of impatience and the reflection of all their years in the water puddles at his feet. There was the strange scuffle of his foot and the shuffle of her hand as it picked the phone to her mouth to ask, "Who is it?"

There was the weak admission of his existence, and the familiar exchange of words she knew well, "It's just me."

He thought she'd scream at him, right then, from her phone into his face. But there was the buzz of her unlocking the front door. He pushed through and stood in the dark stairwell, dripping wetly onto the ceramic floor. He thought of turning the lights on, but there was the silence and darkness that told him secrecy and shadow were more appropriate.

He carefully made his way up the stairs to her floor. She stood in her doorway, and when she saw him, she moved away from the door and let it half-open. There was a strange silence to her. He entered her apartment and shut the door.

"Are you mad?" He asked.

"Are you mad?" She asked.

Am I mad, and there was the question hanging in the air. He noticed there was almost no light in her apartment. There was rain heavily hammering her windows, and there was the heavier silence of their unspoken pain. There was the large weight of their history and the constant reminder in their hearts of their previous arguments. There was, this time, the uncomfortable presence of desire and uncertainty.

There was, he then understood, a nearly physical stranglehold on their hearts, one that subdued all that which they knew and put their blood to silence.

Are you mad, they'd asked, and there was the answer in the air.

"No," he said.

"No," she said.

There was the sigh of fabric as she came to him, and the whisper of his arms encircling her waist. There was the shared relief; there was the clenching of their arms around each other and the single, steady heartbeat. There was her happiness in his blood and his feeling in hers. There was a single person standing in the apartment, yet there were two individuals.

There was many a reason for him to show up tonight, he'd mused, but none of them were quite as convincing as the simple love he'd devoted her. That alone was the true reason for him to notice all that there was about her.

There was her smile. There was his grin.

There was his breathless whisper in her ear. "Can I stay?"

* * *

**Well, yeah, yeah. I'll go back to writingPrivateer now. **

**Love,  
CM**


End file.
